Advertisement

Region's most dilapidated schools to be repaired

15 schools in the Anglia region are to get government funding to repair buildings. Photo: David Jones/PA Wire/Press Association Images

Around 250 of the most dilapidated schools in the country are to be given funding to repair their buildings including 15 in the Anglia region. In total, 587 schools in England had applied to the Government for money earmarked to fix those in the worst condition.

Of these, just under half, 261 in total, were told today that their bid for funding under the £2 billion Priority School Building Programme (PSBP) has been successful.

In a written statement, Education Secretary Michael Gove said he recognised that many of the schools which had applied but failed to receive funding will also have "significant condition needs".

He said: "I know that many schools will be disappointed not to be included in the programme. We have had to take difficult decisions in order to target spending on those schools that are in the worst condition."

These are the schools in the Anglia region included in the building programme:

David Simmonds, chair of the LGA's children and young people board, said: "This funding is the result of councils' pressure on DfE and will go some way to addressing the problems facing some of our most dilapidated schools. But we are still in a situation where more than 300 run-down schools have been left in limbo after lengthy delays in government decision-making."

Shadow education secretary Stephen Twigg said: "Following a six- month delay, the Education Secretary has today published the results of the Government's programme for capital investment in schools. Schools and parents have for too long been kept in the dark.

"This delay exposes the incompetence that has marred the Education Secretary's handling of schools capital, since his scrapping of the Building Schools for the Future Programme back in the summer of 2010.

"Of course, schools, parents and pupils in those schools that have secured funding today will be relieved and we welcome that investment."